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The revival of Russian military power poses certain challenges to NATO and the West. Russia’s military developments are best understood as a continuation of longer-term factors in the country’s history.
Throughout the 1990s and up until the announcement of a systematic programme of military modernisation in 2008, the Russian armed forces fell into a state of serious decline. Their shortcomings were painfully demonstrated during the two Chechen wars, where they struggled to defeat an opponent that was vastly inferior numerically and technologically. In the eyes of the world, Russia had lost its status as a global military actor, because it seemed clear that its ability to project military power beyond its borders had become distinctly limited. This international image was overhauled almost overnight in the aftermath of the Crimea annexation in spring 2014 and in the wake of the ongoing air campaign over Syria.
Today Russia is again seen as a serious military player. The interventions in Ukraine and Syria have led to fears in the West that the process of Russian military modernisation is motivated by an about-turn in foreign policy that includes an ever increasing military adventurism and expansionism. However, it is likely that Russia’s reasons for rebuilding conventional military capabilities are more complex than this. Rather than signifying a clear break with the past instigated by President Putin, recent developments in the Russian military are a continuation of longer-term factors in the country’s history, and foreign and defence policy. Within this context, Russia’s ‘military revival’ was inevitable and hardly surprising.
The thawing of the Cold War and Russia’s military decline and revival
Image via Kremlin/Wikimedia.
Russia’s self-perception as a great power and its desire to be granted this status by the international community dates back centuries and this did not cease with the end of the Cold War. Having a large and powerful military has always been key to Russia’s great power ambitions. It was central to the making of the Tsarist empire and a strong military, above all else, elevated the Soviet Union to the status of a superpower. Against this background, the period of neglect of the Russian armed forces throughout the 1990s was uncharacteristic and should have come as more of a surprise than the more recent modernisation efforts. The lack of military reforms during the 1990s was not the result of a conscious decision on the part of the political leadership to give up on the aspirations of being a global military power, or the belief that a strong military was no longer necessary. On the contrary, Russian great power ambitions, including the maintenance of a military able to project power on a global level date back to the early 1990s. It was a combination of political and financial factors that prevented these ambitions from becoming reality.
The first Russian military doctrine published in 1993 envisaged significant cuts to armed force levels and emphasised the need to develop conventional forces able to deal with local conflicts, which appeared to be the most immediate concern at the time. However, the idea that a global conventional deterrent was no longer desirable or required was never a consensus view. In fact, the 1993 doctrine already reflected serious ambitions to maintain a globally competitive conventional deterrent. The ambition for parity in conventional military power was reiterated in the 2000 military doctrine, which explicitly reoriented priorities away from the focus on small-wars type scenarios and towards the need for the creation of Russian conventional forces with global reach.
Between 2000 and 2008 the Russian economy grew by an average of almost 7 percent per year, a rate of growth that was matched by similar annual increases in the defence budget. This meant that, following years of economic turmoil during the 1990s when even a relatively high percentage of GDP – an average of four percent – spent on defence was insufficient to sustain the military on a reasonable level, Russia’s long-standing ambition to rebuild a military fit for a great power had finally become affordable. Relinquishing armed strength and accepting the resulting loss of great power status was never an option that was seriously entertained in Russia. From this point of view, the revival of the Russian military was only a matter of time.
The idea that the revival of Russian conventional military capabilities in recent years can only be motivated by the political leadership’s intention to engage in ever more aggressive, expansionist and offensive military action also requires further contextualisation. Such a view represents a one-sided understanding of why countries, as a rule, maintain powerful armed forces. As Robert Art wrote in 1996, ‘to focus only on the physical use of military power is to miss most of what most states do most of the time with the military power at their disposal’. In other words, countries do not only have militaries to fight offensive wars, but also to deter, coerce, compel, reassure or dissuade other actors. International prestige is another important motivation for states to maintain powerful militaries. Given the centrality of the military in Russia’s self-perception as a great power this factor is particularly salient for understanding the motivations behind its recent military revival.
After years of decay, during which the West had written off Russia as a serious global military competitor, conspicuous displays of military power and brinkmanship, coupled with the interventions in Crimea and Syria, have been an effective way of rapidly enhancing the international image of Russia’s newly modernised military. Such a use of military power for ‘swaggering’, which according to Art can has historically helped countries to gain ‘prestige on the cheap’ has already yielded impressive results. Although Russia’s relative military power is still severely lacking in comparison to the US and NATO, international reactions to recent displays of its revived armed forces have arguably enhanced its global image to an extent that far exceeds its material capabilities. The international community is again viewing Russian military power as a serious competitor, as Russia has already achieved one of its long-standing objectives. International recognition as a great power has been a central aim of Russian foreign policy throughout history. Now that the country is yet again seen as a global military power it has gained such recognition, at least in part, but based on fear, rather than on respect.
The future of Russia’s power projection
Better military capabilities mean that the Russian leadership today has more opportunity to resort to the use of force. The air campaign in Syria, for example, would simply not have been possible ten years ago, even if the willingness to launch an intervention of this kind had been there. It is unlikely, however, that better capabilities will cause the country’s leaders to lose sight of the fact that the utility of military force is limited and not suited for the achievement of all foreign policy objectives.
Nonetheless, developments in Russian defence and foreign policy are a concern and a difficult challenge to international security. With the Crimea annexation, Russia demonstrated its willingness to use military force for territorial expansion for the first time in post-Cold war history. This has understandably led to growing fears, especially amongst its neighbours, about Russian intentions and the potential for further expansionist moves. Russia’s interventions in Ukraine and in Syria have also led to tensions with the West that are incomparable in scale and scope to problems in the recent past.
There are limited options available to the West and to the international community to stop the Russian military modernisation process, bar the imposition of sanctions banning the export of defence technology and dual-use equipment into Russia, which the US and EU have already put into place. It will also be difficult, as it has been in the past, to prevent Russia from using military force as an instrument of foreign policy in certain situations in the future.
There are choices to be made, then, on deciding how to respond to these developments. When it comes to dealing with Russian military interventions, the West can only lead by example in using military force as a last resort and within the parameters of international law, and condemn Russia in the strongest terms when it does not do the same.
It is clear that Russian military actions in Ukraine and Syria have already had serious consequences for the country’s international image. As complete isolation is not in Russia’s interest and it continues craving respect as a Great Power from the global community, there is some hope that international repercussions and condemnation will be a factor in its future decisions to use military force. There are also choices to be made about how to respond to aggressive Russian military posturing vis-à-vis NATO and other neighbouring states.
For the time being, NATO has chosen the path of an uncompromisingly tough stance, strengthening its presence alongside its eastern borders in an attempt to demonstrate unity and resolve and to deter any potential military aggression. While these measures are likely to reassure NATO member states in eastern and central Europe, their potential long-term consequences, like a renewed arms race and increasing dangers of escalation, should not be ignored.
It is already obvious that Russia is not interpreting NATO’s actions in the spirit intended, as defensive measures aimed at reassuring NATO members close to its borders. Instead, Russia has taken these moves as an opportunity for further ‘swaggering’ and showing off its military power, stepping up its own activities and presence in the region.
It is not yet clear how Russia’s relations with NATO and with the West will evolve under the next US administration headed by Donald Trump. Although some analysts have argued that the new US president is good news for Russia, such a conclusion remains at least questionable or is at least premature.
If the US will indeed steer towards a more isolationist stance, it is possible that criticism of Russian military brinkmanship in the Baltic region and beyond, and violations of international law during military conflicts where this does not directly impinge onto US interests, will diminish. Such a turn of events would certainly be welcomed in Moscow, where the country’s full sovereignty to use military force as a foreign policy instrument is seen as centrally important.
At the same time, it is by no means certain that the US will abandon its position as an important actor in European and international security and it is unlikely that the new US administration will be happy to concede this role to Russia, in effect abandoning its preeminent position in the international system. It is beyond doubt that Donald Trump’s presidency will confront Russia with a serious degree of uncertainty and unpredictability, much more so than the election of Hilary Clinton would have done. The extent to which this unpredictability — including the potential for harsher US reactions towards Russian military adventurism and an increased risk of escalation — will influence Russian foreign policy decision-making is a question for the future.
Bettina Renz is an associate professor at the University of Nottingham’s School of Politics and International Relations. She has published widely on Russian defence and security policy.
A crowd of demonstrators participating in a protest against the ongoing use of weapons by rebel militias inside Tripoli and accompanying atmosphere of lawlessness wave banners demanding disarmament and the creation of a national army. The newly-formed Libyan government is struggling to assert itself over the disparate power actors who emerged over the past year.
As the price of oil goes down, the pace of freedom goes up… As the price of oil goes up, the pace of freedom goes down…” So says New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who argues that the first law of ‘petropolitics’ is that the price of oil and the pace of freedom are inversely correlated in countries “totally dependent on oil” for economic growth. Friedman’s attempt to link economic oil dependency and political freedom is an interesting one, which could go some way towards explaining why many of the world’s top oil-exporting countries are governed by heavy-handed authoritarian regimes. However, the correlation between recent oil price spikes and anti-authoritarian action – particularly in the Arab Spring – challenges Friedman’s assessment.
Rather than being driven by drops in oil revenues for authoritarian regimes, popular unrest and armed resistance in countries such as Libya may in fact be correlated with the price of oil remaining high. Inward pressure caused by oil price spikes on petroleum-fuelled supply chains for basic commodities can exacerbate already harsh living conditions, galvanising rebel factions to form a unified anti-authoritarian front against a regime that can no longer ensure price stability for essential goods. This seems true of the 2011 uprising in Egypt (the world’s largest wheat importer), as bread prices rose drastically following the doubling of global wheat prices between June 2010 and February 2011. The impact of high oil prices on the production, shipping and distribution of staple commodities such as corn and wheat – both of which saw severe price escalations of near 40% in 2008 – can lead to social unrest and, in the case of Egypt, the toppling of an authoritarian regime.
Since December 2010, when mass protests began gathering steam in Tunisia, oil prices have remained consistently high, hovering at $82 per barrel. Is it a coincidence that in September 2011, when rebels overtook the coastal town of Bani Walid, one of Colonel Gaddafi’s last strongholds, oil was just above $82 per barrel and the FAO food price index had reached a ten-year high? While oil revenues may be a temporary source of political stability for some authoritarian regimes, the pressure of increasing price volatility on supply chains, due to scarcity in supply, can convert to instability downstream as oil prices have a compounding impact on food prices. Indeed, in December 2010 just a week before the self-immolation of Tunisian food vendor Mohamed Bouazizi, New England Complex Systems Institute a Cambridge-based organisation comprised of faculty from Harvard, MIT and Brandeis, warned the US government that global food prices were about to cross a socially dangerous threshold. If anti-authoritarian action is any indication of freedom ‘on the rise’ then high oil prices in oil-dependent states are at least one major factor.
Of those countries mentioned in the International Energy Agency’s 2011 list of top oil exporters, ten out of fifteen are classed by Freedom House as ‘Not Free’. Freedom House, ‘an independent watchdog organisation dedicated to the expansion of freedom around the world’, base their rankings on two broad categories: political rights and civil liberties. The former they define by a country’s electoral process, degree of political pluralism and level of participation/ functioning of government; the latter by degree of freedom of expression and belief, associational and organisational rights, rule of law, and personal autonomy and individual rights. The irony, according to Friedman, is that Western dependence on oil imports from countries which are ‘Not Free’ has channelled revenues to authoritarian regimes that oppose freedom. This paradox undermines Western credibility as champions of democracy. In a post-9/11 world, where militant extremists reportedly seek safe harbour in oil-exporting states like Saudi Arabia, the consequences of Western oil dependency undermine the West’s long-term security goals. But, when it comes to Friedman’s equation for ‘petropolitics’, the reverse may actually be true. Recent events such as the Arab Spring demonstrate that as the price of oil rises, impacting staple commodity prices, so too does the need for change – change that is blocked by Western dependence on remaining regimes.
Western countries reliant on fossil fuel imports from nations ruled by authoritarian regimes are suffering from a crisis of legitimacy – a crisis which could render us more insecure in the long term. In Algeria, where the Arab Spring has not resulted in full on revolution, violent extremists recently made their presence felt at the ‘In Amenas’ gas plant, brutally murdering 37 expatriate workers. The plant, which is jointly operated by BP, Norway’s Statoil and Algerian state oil and gas company Sonatrach, is a major supply source for Western markets. Algeria is responsible for roughly 12.2 billion barrels of crude oil reserves. 85% of Algeria’s oil exports are destined for European and North American markets. Under the leadership of Abdelaziz Bouteflika, whose five year executive terms are renewable indefinitely, Algeria certainly does not rate highly on the list of Freedom House ‘Freedom Ratings’. Military and intelligence services strictly monitor and interfere with open elections. But the Arab Spring may not ever reach Algeria precisely because of the stability brought to the country by a Western-funded heavy-handed regime, which goes to great lengths to protect the general population from militant Islamist extremists and pro-democracy activists alike. Saudi Arabia and UAE are governed by similarly oppressive regimes; regimes which subvert democracy in favour of ‘stability’. Both supply oil and gas to the West. Both benefit from revenues gained through Western dependence in spite of their heavy-handedness.
The Arab Spring has been full of unfortunate surprises linking former and current administrations to corrupt leaders. Photos of a smiling Tony Blair, getting up close and personal with much maligned Colonel Gaddafi, were a hit in the mainstream press as well as online following the collapse of his regime. Not long before that, the Bush Family’s close ties to the Saudi royal family did little to lend credence to their Middle East pro-democracy campaigns in the early 90s and 2000s.
Germany is in a similarly awkward position as the the largest energy consumer in Europe, with oil making up 38% of Europe’s overall consumption in 2011. Germany is Russian state-controlled energy giant Gazprom’s biggest European customer with 34% of total sales volume of Russian ‘blue fuel’ destined for German markets last year. There was therefore more than a hint of hypocrisy in Angela Merkel’s recent remarks during a visit by Vladimir Putin to a trade fair in Hanover that Russia ‘needs more NGOs’. The statement was made in regards to a Russian law passed last year requiring all NGOs that receive overseas funding to register as ‘foreign agents’. Topless Ukrainian activists from the pro women’s rights group ‘Femen’ made their presence felt at the trade fair, drawing attention to Russia’s crackdown on civil society groups and independent media organisations. Russia’s authoritarianism is a key element of the Putin government, but the issue arguably receives little mainstream coverage in the West compared to the Middle East.
Germany and, by extension, Europe’s de facto dependence on Gazprom to meet their energy needs provides yet another example of why Western countries need to seek develop a more sustainable energy security strategy. It is difficult to legitimately champion broad concerns about upholding civil protections, when some of your largest business partners engage in the shadowy practice of denying basic freedoms to their own citizens.
In light of the above we can welcome new approaches to energy security, which are aimed at reducing dependence on fossil fuel imports from authoritarian states. The Obama Administration’s ‘All of the Above’ energy strategy, as well as the pragmatism which the European Union, led by Germany, has shown in pushing forward a low carbon agenda are both steps in the right direction. Obama has pledged to double American energy efficiency by 2030, setting aside $2 billion over 10 years to support research into ‘a range of cost-effective technologies’, including electric vehicles, domestically-sourced biofuels, fuel cells, and domestically-produced natural gas. The plan also includes scope for reducing oil imports, while boosting renewable electricity generation from wind, solar and geothermal sources. Although Obama’s plan is far from low carbon, it shows promise. By comparison the UK Government, which at one time pledged to be the ‘greenest government ever’, has attempted to push forward its nationwide low carbon transition through the establishment of a Green Investment Bank. However, fairly recent public squabbles in the UK between Ed Davey, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change and Chancellor George Osborne the UK’s finance minister, have called that agenda into question.
Friedman’s claim of an inverse correlation between high oil prices and authoritarianism is flawed. But his point about ‘petropolitics’ is still crucial to security, not only because he tries to link oil price fluctuations to authoritarian politics, but also because he highlights how Western dependence on foreign oil provides significant revenue streams on which remaining authoritarian governments can rely. It is also important to point out that as the global price of oil becomes more volatile due to price instability (see: ‘peaky behaviour’) the economic stability of authoritarian regimes that have consolidated their power bases around fossil fuels will almost certainly erode. Moreover, as the impact of oil prices continue to destabilise staple commodity prices, authoritarian regimes will almost certainly come under increasing pressure from their own populations to step down. Western countries that have formed dubious partnerships with these regimes in order to meet their energy security needs will risk further embarrassment when these regimes are toppled by the inevitable anti-authoritarian movements. Western leaders might then stand by and wait to pick a winner – a dubious strategy at best – in order to ensure that supply shipments are not further destabilised. But is this sustainable?
Renewable energy is not the most obvious factor for bolstering the strength of nations. But it is fast becoming clear that Western dependency on fossil fuel imports from countries governed by heavy-handed regimes cannot go on. The International Energy Agency has recently announced that power generation from renewable sources worldwide will exceed that from gas and be twice that from nuclear by 2016. That’s a positive sign. As for oil, we will have to wait and see. But if the restoration of Western legitimacy as champions of the “free world” is a top priority for Western leaders, then more support for domestic renewable energy growth is essential.
Phillip Bruner is Founder of the Green Investment Forum and a guest lecturer in global political economy at the University of Edinburgh
Image source: United Nations Photo
Following President Rouhani’s success in last August’s election, relations between the United States and Tehran have improved substantially, partly because of the election result but also because the Obama administration has a more positive view of Iran. There is no guarantee that the US election in 2016 will result in an administration sympathetic to further progress. This element of uncertainty will be factored into the policy-making process of the Rouhani administration. Even so, prospects for a negotiated settlement to the nuclear issue are the best they have been for a decade and it follows that if an agreement is concluded, this is likely to have a pronounced effect on Iranian foreign policy as it finds itself in a more positive international environment.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is greeted by the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Source: Wikipedia
The flamboyance and the sometimes inflammatory rhetoric of the Ahmadinejad administration (2005-13) disguised a pragmatic foreign policy that combined a degree of confrontation on the nuclear issue with the enhancing of contacts with many countries across the global south, including left-leaning states in Latin America and numerous states in sub-Saharan Africa. It also sought to maintain reasonable links with Russia and China while limiting links with the West. While acceptable to much of the “Iranian street”, it was at odds with the liking of elements of western culture by young Iranians and the nuclear issue was deeply problematic in terms of the impact of sanctions.
While much is made of their role in bringing Rouhani to power and then to the negotiating table, the reality is rather different. Sanctions were effective, in part, because of the parallel impact of internal economic mismanagement by the Ahmadinejad government. Thus, if the Rouhani government improves the management of the economy then even the modest sanctions relief already promised will combine to enable the government to benefit through early respite from recent economic woes.
One other key factor is that Iran’s standing in the region, including the Arab world, has been damaged by its support for the Assad regime in Syria. Under Ahmadinejad, Iran saw the Assad regime as a strong and necessary ally, especially in combination with the Maliki government in Iraq. But as the war in Syria has worsened, and as the violence in Iraq degenerates towards a civil war, many states blame Iran. Regional powers such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt hold Iran partly responsible for the violent suppression of the Sunni majority in Syria, and states beyond the region believe Iran bears some responsibility not just for that but also for the possible spread of the war to Lebanon.
Hassan Rouhani speaks in Mashhad during his presidential campaign Source: Wikimedia
Rouhani’s victory was singularly impressive in that he gained an absolute majority on the first ballot against four relatively conservative opponents on a 72% poll turnout. While this has given him considerable authority, most power still lies with the Supreme Leader. However, Ayatollah Khamenei has to be aware of the popularity of Rouhani, a matter made more difficult for him by Rouhani’s preference for avoiding a personality cult. While the election gave Rouhani a clear mandate for negotiating with the US, conservative elements are regrouping.
For these elements a particular concern is the election of the Assembly of Experts – the parliamentary upper house, which selects the Supreme Leader – that are due in September this year. Their fear is of a buoyant Rouhani government that will damage conservative prospects still further following last year’s reversals. It appears to be for this reason that they have sought to persuade the Supreme Leader to expand the negotiating team at the Syria peace talks in Geneva to include more hard-line elements and to have a Majlis (parliamentary) oversight body for the whole process. This would be dominated by conservatives. Rouhani’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Seyed Abbas Araqchi, has stated officially that the negotiating group remains accountable to the Supreme National Security Council, not a Majlis body, but there are reports of more members recently being appointed to the group.
What this means is that the Rouhani government will have a strong interest in developing policies that are attractive to the domestic constituency as soon as possible. The emphasis will undoubtedly be on the nuclear issue and getting further sanctions relief which, in combination with better economic management, could ensure palpable improvements in the economy and consequent political popularity. This, though, is not enough and liberalising economic reforms such as removal of subsidies may even exacerbate short-term economic difficulties. It follows that the Rouhani government will be looking closely at ways of increasing Iran’s standing in the region and beyond.
A key aspect of the Iranian outlook is a belief in Persia’s very proud history, one that extends over thousands rather than hundreds of years, and the consequent belief that Iran has not been realising its potential as one of the world’s potential great powers. This view of historic greatness transcends religion, even if Iran sees itself also as the centre of the Shi’a Muslim world. Iran has a population of 80 million, a little less than Egypt at 85 million and Turkey at 81 million. Egypt has formidable internal problems and a weak non-oil-based economy; Turkey is far stronger in terms of economy, even if it, too, lacks significant fossil fuel reserves. Since its 2013 counter-revolution, Egypt is also increasingly reliant on Saudi Arabia, Iran’s greatest rival for influence in the Gulf and wider Middle East.
Iran has all the problems of a near-moribund economy but has remarkable potential for development given that it has close to 10% of world oil reserves and 15% of gas reserves. The latter is largely shared with Qatar because of the huge reserves under the Gulf. There have so far been few problems of delineating boundaries – indeed relations with Qatar remain quite good despite major differences on other issues such as Syria, where Qatar, with Turkey, strongly backs the anti-Assad rebellion.
Iran Foreign Minister Javad Zarif walks with EU High Representative Catherine Ashton at the EU +3 and Iran talks, November 2013. Source: EEAS (Flickr)
The issue for Iran relates largely to where it seeks to develop its economic and political alliances. To the immediate east the borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan are hugely significant, especially in the case of Afghanistan where opium and refined heroin smuggling across the border has cost the lives of hundreds of Iranian border guards. Iran has close links with the north-west parts of Afghanistan and has no liking for the Taliban. It is suspicious of Pakistan because of radical Sunni Islamist elements within the state, its long-term support for the Taliban, close security ties to Saudi Arabia and the precarious security predicament of the Pakistani Shi’a community, but still seeks to improve relations, not least through exporting gas. The originally planned Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline is going ahead as far as Pakistan. Iran will further increase its links with Afghanistan, where it has greatly increased aid in recent years, especially to projects in the north-west of the country.
India and China are both significant importers of Iranian oil and gas and China has been particularly useful to Iran in two respects. One has been long-term investment in the development of new oil and gas fields, and it remains much appreciated that China persisted with this when relations with the US were at their lowest. The other has been China’s supply of carefully selected weapons, especially shore-based anti-ship cruise missiles. Iran will maintain close links with China, but will not eschew improved relations with India, seeing it as a useful counter-balance to Pakistan.
The links with southern and eastern Asia will remain highly significant in terms of Iranian foreign policy but it is already clear that a priority will be to improve relations with neighbouring Turkey, already demonstrated by the meeting between Foreign Ministers Mohammad Javad Zarif and Ahmet Davutoglu in Tehran last November. In spite of considerable differences over Syria, the countries have good relations in other respects, and Turkey’s past role in trying to defuse the nuclear issue remains appreciated. Trade relations between Iran and Turkey have expanded greatly in the past decade.
It is highly likely that Iran will seek a much closer relationship with Turkey, seeing the two countries together comprising an axis of influence linking Europe and Asia. The Turkish attitude to this is likely to be very positive, seeing it as a useful factor in increasing Turkey’s significance for the European Union. This does mean that the Rouhani government has an added interest in seeing a scaling down of the Syrian War. It is probable that a Turkey/Iran connection is more important to Tehran than the much vaunted Lebanon/Syria/Iraq/Iran “Shi’a crescent”.
The rivalry with Saudi Arabia remains pervasive and is a crucial proxy element in the Syrian conflict but Rouhani’s personal links with Saudi diplomats in the past, combined with Iran’s need to see the war scaled down, means that even here there may be potential for progress. Further improving relations with the US will be a priority but the Rouhani government recognises the risk of sudden changes in US leadership in less than three years time. This means that European links remain useful but Iran does not look to the west to ensure its standing in the world. Turkey, China and India are more significant and this will remain as long as Rouhani is in power. Of these, Turkey is probably the most important.
Rouhani has barely a year all told to build on the considerable support he gathered last year, and this is against a background of entrenched conservative and theocratic elements that will work hard to limit his capacity. While he will give ground on nuclear issues and may work towards a Syrian settlement, if Iran is allowed to participate in Geneva ll, there is a risk that this can be presented by his opponents as a sign of weakness. Economic progress might blunt this but an additional way forward is to engage in a much more active foreign policy. One consequence of such a shift to the north and east is that Iran may not see Europe as important to its interests to the extent that Europe sees Iran. This is a reflection of more general global changes, bringing its own challenges.
Paul Rogers is Global Security Consultant to Oxford Research Group, for which he writes monthly security briefings. He is Professor of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford and author of numerous books including ‘Beyond Terror’. Paul writes a weekly column for openDemocracy and tweets regularly at @ProfPRogers.
Featured image: President Rouhani delivers remarks at the Hilton Hotel in New York City, September 2013. Source: Asia Society (Flickr)
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